The swanherds where their sedges are
Moved on in sunset's golden breath,
The shepherde lads I hearde afarre,
And my son's wife, Elizabeth;
Till floating o'er the grassy sea
Came down that kindly message free,
"The Brides of Mavis Enderby.
Then some looked uppe into the sky,
And all along where Lindis flows
To where the goodly vessels lie,
And where the lordly steeple shows.
They sayde, "And why should this thing be?
What danger lowers by land or sea?
They ring the tune of Enderby!
"For evil news from Mablethorpe,
Of pyrate galleys warpings down;
For shippes ashore beyond the scorpe,
They have not spared to wake the towne;
But while the west bin red to see,
And storms be none, and pyrates flee,
Why ring 'The Brides of Enderby'?"
I looked without, and lo! my sonne
Came riding down with might and main.
He raised a shout as he drew on,
Till all the welkin rang again,
"Elizabeth! Elizabeth!"
(A sweeter woman ne'er drew breath
Than my sonne's wife, Elizabeth.)
"The olde sea wall (he cried) is downe, The rising tide comes on apace, And boats adrift in yonder towne Go sailing up the market-place.' He shook as one that looks on death. "God save you, mother!" straight he saith; "Where is my wife, Elizabeth?"
"Good sonne, where Lindis winds away,
With her two bairns I marked her long,
And ere yon bells beganne to play
Afar I heard her milking song."
He looked across the grassy lea,
To right, to left, "Ho Enderby!"
They rang "The Brides of Enderby!"
With that he cried and beat his breast;
For lo! along the river's bed
A mighty eygre reared his crest,
And uppe the Lindis raging sped,
It swept with thund'rous noises loud;
Shaped like a curling snow-white cloud,
Or like a demon in a shroud.
And rearing Lindis backward prest
Shook all her trembling banks amaine;
Then madly at the eygre's breast
Flung uppe her weltering walls again.
Then banks came downe with ruin and rout-
Then beaten foam flew round about—
Then all the mighty floods were out.
So farre, so fast the eygre drave,
The heart had hardly time to beat, Before a shallow seething wave
Sobbed in the grasses at oure feet. The feet had hardly time to flee Before it brake against the knee, And all the world was in the sea.
Upon the roofe we sate that night,
The noise of bells went sweeping by;
I marked the lofty beacon light
Stream from the church tower, red and high
A lurid mark and dread to see;
And awesome bells they were to mee,
That in the dark rang "Enderby."
They rang the sailor lads to guide
From roofe to roofe who fearless rowed;
And I-my sonne was at my side,
And yet the ruddy beacon glowed;
And yet he moaned beneath his breath:
"Oh come in life, or come in death!
Oh lost! my love, Elizabeth!"
And didst thou visit him no more?
Thou didst, thou didst, my daughter deare; The waters laid thee at his doore,
Ere yet the early dawn was clear. Thy pretty bairns in fast embrace, The lifted sun shone on thy face, Downe drifted to thy dwelling-place.
That flow strewed wrecks about the grass,
That ebbe swept out the flocks to sea;
A fatal ebbe and flow, alas!
To many more than myne and mee;
But each will mourn his own (she saith),
And sweeter woman ne'er drew breath
Than my sonne's wife, Elizabeth.
The sea! the sea! the open sea!
The blue, the fresh, the ever free!
Without a mark, without a bound,
It runneth the earth's wide regions round;
It plays with the clouds, it mocks the skies,
Or like a cradled creature lies.
I'm on the sea! I'm on the sea!
I am where I would ever be;
With the blue above, and the blue below,
And the silence wheresoe'er I go;
If a storm should come and awake the deep,
What matter? I shall ride and sleep.
I love, oh how I love to ride
On the fierce, foaming, bursting tide,
When every mad wave drowns the moon,
Or whistles aloft his tempest tune,
And tells how goeth the world below,
And why the sou'west blasts do blow.
I never was on the dull, tame shore,
But I loved the great sea more and more,
And backward flew to her billowy breast,
Like a bird that seeketh its mother's nest;
And a mother she was, and is, to me;
For I was born on the open sea!
The waves were white, and red the morn,
In the noisy hour when I was born;
And the whale it whistled, the porpoise rolled,
And the dolphins bared their backs of gold;
And never was heard such an outcry wild
As welcomed to life the ocean-child!
I've lived since then in calm and strife,
Full fifty summers, a sailor's life,
With wealth to spend and a power to range,
But never have sought nor sighed for change; And Death, whenever it comes to me,
Shall come on the wild, unbounded sea!
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed,--and gazed,—but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
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